Browsing archives for November, 2010

I’ve been lucky enough to spend a lot of time at this incredible place over the past 14 years, but I’ve only seen a sunset like this happen two or three times. You’ll be gazing out at the sun going over the horizon, and then you turn around and suddenly realize the last light of the day is illuminating massive clouds right over the roof of the house. It’s rare, but this time I was ready for it.

All of life is ephemeral, but by photographing these moments we capture them and make them ours. I may never see this scene again, but I’ve made a photo of it, and now it can be preserved and shared with the rest of the world. Scott Bourne at Photofocus recently wrote a great post on the subject, and it’s definitely worth a read.

If Starbucks is already hawking their gingerbread and eggnog lattes and CVS is sporting candy cane decorations behind their checkout counter, it’s certainly not too early to post a Christmas photo, right? The truth is, I’ve come around to the viewpoint that we should start celebrating Christmas (or whatever holiday near the winter solstice is relevant to those of your religious persuasion) as early as possible. I think people like to rush into the holiday spirit because it insulates them from the grim onset of winter. That and it sells more lattes. In any case, we should enjoy it, because after the holiday charm expires on New Year’s Day, we’ve still got a few more cold, dark months before we see trees this green again.

The Pacific can get extremely rough along the Na Pali coast on the north side of Kauai, but the coastline is stunningly beautiful and there’s no way to get there except by sea. Hence, groups of kayakers will work their way across the uninhabited shore over the course of a few days. I think it would be an absolutely amazing trip and I was constantly on watch for kayakers while we flew overhead in the helicopter. The symmetry of this scene really caught my eye, with the implicit safety of the shade on one side and the pounding surf on the other, and the beached kayaks scattered in between.